


Our Journey

by uswnttrash



Category: Women's Soccer RPF
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-10-16
Updated: 2016-10-16
Packaged: 2018-08-22 17:06:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,219
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8293427
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/uswnttrash/pseuds/uswnttrash
Summary: From then to now....Christen and Tobin's journey from when they both were with other people to now when they are constantly killing us fans with their cuteness.





	

It was an unwritten rule that Tobin was always one of the last people to leave the pitch after practice.

Sometimes she was joined by Alex when her nerves got the best of her before a big game and she wanted to practice more one touch strike. Or Kelley who wanted to see if she could defend Tobin and her fancy footwork. Or someone else who needed more time or wanted Tobin to try to teach them something.

Whoever it was never lasted long though and it was always Tobin who was left behind.

One person she never saw stay behind was Christen. Now Tobin knew enough about Christen at this point. They were friends from the start thanks to Kelley but it grew with time. Still they weren’t the closest of friends. There always seemed to be some kind of tension between them that stopped them from getting to the level that Tobin was with with Alex, Kelley and the other usual people.

Still she knew enough which is why it was a surprise that Christen never stayed behind to perfect her strikes or her first touches. She was a perfectionist after all from what Tobin gathered.

It became apparent though after numerous practices that Christen didn’t stay because she worked on perfecting things alone or at training facilities.

One day was different though. One day Christen was different and everyone noticed during practice. She was always somewhat quiet but this day she was too quiet and in practice she was twice as hard on herself.

Kelley and Ali spoke to her each at some point throughout and it seemed to work for the time being. At the end of practice, she was the first one to head to the locker room. Tobin had a call-in interview for a Portland magazine right after so they went to do that in one of the press rooms.

Once it was done, Tobin headed to the pitch and Alex headed to the exit.

As Tobin walked, she saw someone shooting into the goal and each shot looked harder than the last. She realized it was Christen who must have gone to the locker room to get more water and her bag.

Tobin watched for a few moments just because she was shocked that Christen was finally here. She took a deep breath before approaching and she made sure to juggle the ball a little so Christen would hear her coming.

She knew that Christen heard but she never acknowledged her and the closer Tobin got, the clearer it was that Christen was crying.

Once it finally became impossible for her to ignore her any longer, Christen finally took a deep breath and looked over at Tobin. She was expecting her to ask what was wrong but in typical Tobin fashion, the expected didn’t come.

“You need a keeper?” When she didn’t get an answer, she rubbed the back of her neck before continuing. “I probably won’t be any good. To be honest, your shots kind of scare me so I’d move every time but….”

“I’m done shooting.” Christen interrupted her.

Tobin immediately closed her mouth thinking that she scared Christen off or something. She was just about to tell her that she’d come back later and leave her alone when Christen spoke up again.

“Can you show me a trick?”

The request threw Tobin a little and her response was just simply opening and closing her mouth a few times before offering Christen a confused look.

The look caused Christen to laugh despite her obvious sadness. “A trick, Miss YouTube Sensation.” She clarified, laughing a little more. “I don’t know. What’s your first touch secret? I’ll take anything.”

Tobin looked down at the ball before she dribbled it a little and kicked it up to Christen who missed catching it. “If you really want my secrets, the first two rules are that you have to stop thinking and stop being jealous of my hits on YouTube.”

“I didn’t peg you for a rule person.” Christen commented back as she reached down to pick the ball up. As she was coming back up, she quickly wiped away any tears she might have had lingering.

Tobin just shrugged in response before reaching over and taking the ball. “You don’t need any help with your first touches, Chris…”

“But…”

“No, there’s no but anything.” Tobin interrupted this time around which took Christen by surprise a little bit. “You don’t realize how good you are, do you?”

Christen had a lot of insecurities about her game but for the first time in a long time, she genuinely believed someone when they spoke to her about it.

When she didn’t answer, Tobin continued to speak. “You’re really smart. I mean I know you went to Stanford and all but this is different. You read the game differently. You’re creative, too, but in a different way….” Tobin stopped for a moment. “You are just different but in a really good way, you know?”

Christen smiled a little wider than before. “Thank you, Tobin.” She knew that Tobin wasn’t one for words so those hit her more than they would have had someone else said them.

“No worries.” She flashed just a little bit of that signature smile before it widened. “That was just my way of distracting you so I didn’t have to give away my secrets.”

Christen laughed before throwing the ball at Tobin who wasn’t ready for it. “You just broke one of your rules about thinking.”

“Well, you were right on the whole rule person thing. See I set them but I don’t follow them so I didn’t break any rules.” She countered with and instead of picking the ball up, she kicked it up to her thigh and then grabbed it.

“You got me.” Christen raised her hands in defeat. It was like talking to a child. A few moments passed before she spoke again. “Can you show me that rainbow trick?” She said, trying her best to further describe it by moving her arms.

Tobin laughed but she knew the one Christen was referring to. Instead of saying anything at first, she just demonstrated and then kicked the ball over to Christen. She gave some pretty basic instructions and on Christen’s first attempt, she didn’t even get the ball into the air. This caused the two to bust out laughing and it only got worse with each time Christen tried.

For the first time in her life, Christen didn’t care that she was bad at something when it came to soccer. This was Tobin’s thing. She was just happy she was getting the chance to try it and a chance to be apart of Tobin’s little world.

“Why didn’t you ask me what was wrong?” Christen finally asked after the laughter died down and it was clear that she was not going to be mastering that move tonight or maybe any night.

“Most people say nothing when you ask so I figured I’d just be here and if you wanted to talk, you would…” She said with a shrug. “And I didn’t ask if you were okay because it was clear you weren’t so I mean I’m not Hope Solo or anything but I figured that offer would have been better than playing twenty questions and making you more upset.”

That was such a Tobin thing to say. She learned over the years of knowing her that Tobin seemed oblivious but she actually paid very close attention to things and she knew people extremely well.

“You’re something else, you know that?” She finally commented, shaking her head a little. Tobin just flashed her a wide smile before she went to pick up the ball.

She started to walk off the pitch and Christen was kind of blown away that she didn’t push things any further.

“Tobin, wait.” She called out and Tobin immediately stopped and turned around.

“Dude, we’re going to probably miss dinner for the next week straight if you try to perfect that move. We’ll do it another day I promise…”

“No, no.” Christen ignored the subtle jab and this caused the smile to slowly fade from Tobin’s face. “I just – I’ve been stressed out over the World Cup and Vero and I – we broke up and….”

Tobin raised her hand. “Chris, Christen – you don’t have to…”

“No, I do. I crashed your after-practice practice and you stayed with me anyways and didn’t push me on anything and I’m sorry.”

This caused Tobin to let out a laugh. “There’s nothing to be sorry about. You didn’t crash anything. Besides, I like the company, especially new company.”

Christen smiled widely and almost shyly at her and her stomach flipped. She was just about to speak up again when Tobin noticed her watch light up.

“Oh um….” She said kind of hesitantly. “I actually have to head back. I promised Shirley I’d call her after her game tonight…or well, I guess I mean tonight as in her tonight not ours…so in an hour or so I guess but I have to make sure I watch some of it…”

Christen didn’t even notice Tobin’s rambling because she completely froze when she heard Shirley’s name.

“Yo, Chris, you good?” Tobin snapped softly in front of her.

“Oh, sorry. Yeah, I’m fine and it’s cool.” She tried to recover quickly. “I remember I promised to get dinner with Julie so I should shower and stuff before that.”

Okay, cool.” Tobin offered her a small smile and she then reached down to grab Christen’s bag. She saw her reach for it but insisted that she would carry it.

The two walked silently off the pitch and it was so clear that the atmosphere between them had shifted.

“Kelley was your ride back, right?” Tobin said once they were near the locker room. The look on Christen’s face alone was enough of an answer. “I’ll be right back.” She said before disappearing into the locker room. She came back out a few moments later with her own bag and keys in hand.

The car ride was a little less tense but only because of the soft music playing. Neither one of them dared to change the station and there wasn’t any point since they weren’t staying too far away anyways.

Christen finally took her own bag once they got out of the car and the two made their way into the apartment complex the team was staying in. They were met by a few teammates waiting in the lobby area.

“Yo Press, Tobs.” Kelley, of course, called out and waved them down.

“Kelley, we are the only people around here. You don’t have to yell or wave. They can see us.” Alex said, causing Ali, Ashlyn, Whitney, Meghan and Sydney to laugh.

The two walked over kind of slowly and Tobin cleared her throat once they stopped in front of the small group of their teammates.

“Press, you finally cashed in on your one complimentary ‘Tobin special.’” Ashlyn put the last bit in quotes and shot a face in Tobin’s direction.

“Hey, you never asked for another round because if I remember correctly, your first go around I scored on you every single time so you said you didn’t need the extra practice from me anymore.”

This caused everyone to laugh except for Christen. Kelley just shook it off as her being upset about Vero and Ali and Ashlyn thought the same thing. The others weren’t exactly aware of the situation so they just brushed it off as it being because of whatever was bothering her in practice.

“And the answer is no actually. I was learning from her this time around…” Tobin said and this caused Christen to react as she looked over in clear confusion. Tobin just brushed her off and luckily the team bought it since Christen was a knowledgeable and skilled player. Even the greatest in the world could still learn from her.

Tobin was grateful, too, that the team didn’t push further because she didn’t know how she’d spin it since she actually wasn’t referring to soccer.

“Anyways, are you guys up for a little night on the town tonight?” Kelley said, wiggling her eyebrows.

“What she actually means is game night in Ash and Alex’s room….” Ali clarified since there was no way they’d be allowed to go out this early into camp.

“We could sneak out. I know Whit would 100% be behind that.” Kelley teased the girl who just threw the first small thing she could grab at her.

“I can’t actually do anything….” Christen said. “I’m pretty tired from today so I just want to sleep.” Tobin shot her a look almost immediately. She was so confused and lost in her own thoughts that she didn’t even realize Alex was speaking for her.

“Shirley has a game tonight so Tobin will be a no.” The group groaned. All of them loved Shirley but they found her and Tobin together to be a waste of time for both of them.

“Sorry, guys.” She mumbled out after realizing what Alex just said. “Just time of it this way, that just means one less loss all of you have to suffer and complain about.”

This time someone was throwing something at Tobin and she caught it immediately. She then checked her watch and looked over at Christen.

“You want me to walk you up?” Christen couldn’t even answer verbally so she just nodded. They then said goodbye to the group and just before leaning Tobin threw the ball of paper she had caught back at Kelley, hitting her right on the side of the head.

“Payback’s a bitch, Heath…” She heard just as they got to the elevators.

“She’s probably going to plan to scare you now.” Christen mumbled as the bell dinged and the doors opened. She immediately walked in and leaned against the wall. It was Tobin who hit the number 4 button for their floor.

“I thought you were going for dinner with Julie…” Tobin said. “Did she cancel or something last minute? We could totally go later if you want when I’m done with Shirley…”

Tobin didn’t want Christen to be alone because she knew she might be upset but she also didn’t want to push her either which is why she almost immediately regretted the offer.

“No, she didn’t cancel. I think I’m going to or I’ll just ask her if she wants to order something instead of going out. I’m just not really feeling up to anything now. I guess trying to master the art that is Tobin Heath’s skills is a little more tiring than I thought.” She offered with a small smile as the doors opened for their floor and she was out of the elevator before Tobin could even answer.

Tobin’s room was the closest to the elevator but she kept walking past it and headed towards where she knew Christen’s room was. The way she lingered by the door made it clear that she wasn’t expecting an invite in but simply wanted to walk Christen there.

“Well, I hope everything today didn’t tire you out too much.” She brought the conversation back for a moment. “If you cancel but later decide you want to do something or Julie ends up canceling or anything, just text me, okay? I’ll be up…probably. But I don’t mind doing something if you need someone.”

“I appreciate it, Tobin. I think you did enough for me today though so thanks.”

“You don’t have to thank me…”

Christen offered her a small nod just for the sake of ending that potential argument. She didn’t have the energy to be around Tobin for any longer, especially knowing what Tobin was going to be doing as soon as they parted. With that in mind, she looked at her own watch.

“You better go. You probably only have a few more minutes to look up game stats or something…”

Tobin had honestly forgotten all about that for a moment and she had to shake her head to get her thoughts clear. “Oh yeah, you’re right.” She smiled weakly before taking in a breath. “I’ll see you in the morning, Chris.”

“Yeah, bright and early.” Christen joked but her smile didn’t reach her eyes and the tension was almost unbearable between them. “Have a good night, Tobin.”

She didn’t even wait for a response before she was opening the door to her room. She didn’t even end up showering like she wanted to and instead just called Julie to tell her about what happened earlier. Christen only had to say three key words before Julie stopped her and said she’d be over with food and they’d deal with everything else later.

Tobin got into her room and fell onto her bed with a loud sigh. She sat there for a few moments before pulling out her phone.

She saw the game update and noticed that Shirley’s team won. She had an assist as well which caused Tobin to smile.

Her phone was out and ready but she delayed the call a few more moments so that she could send out a few quick texts.

__To Christen: You really suck at ball tricks but it was cool hanging out and seeing you smile._ _

_To Christen: I’m sorry about what you’re going through. I can’t really help with the first thing but just remember that you’re different in the best way and someday someone’s going to love you the way you deserve because of that._

_To Christen: As for the other thing, you’re a superstar. I’ll remind you of that everyday if I have to._

Tobin hit send and she immediately froze. Her mind was racing because Christen would probably think that was too much. Tobin had just invaded her space all day and Christen was nice enough to keep her around and now she messed things up even further.

She was in the middle of cursing herself in her head and they grew more and more with each passing second without an answer but they stopped once she heard her phone go off. However, it wasn’t a text from Christen. It was one from Shirley telling her she was good to call.

Meanwhile, Christen couldn’t contain the smile on her face from the first text. She had to tone it down though because it was just Tobin being nice.

Before the other two came in, Julie had knocked on the door and she got up to answer it. Julie explained everything she brought and then said how she needed to watch some kind of comedy movie or it wasn’t an official post-breakup girls’ night.

When Christen settled down on her bed again after getting some food, she looked at her phone and noticed the other two texts. This time there was no toning down her smile.

“She really is something else….” She said under her breath and Julie heard it but played dumb anyways. “Oh nothing. Just my sister sent me some weird thing. Typical her.”

“Ah right, sure, Chris.” Julie said with a small smirk on her face as she settled back onto Ali’s bed and hit play on the first terrible movie she could find on demand.

**Author's Note:**

> Just a new multi-chapter I'm working on. I'll return to my other fic soon so I apologize for anyone who has read it and waited for an update.


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